Floor Statements

Mr. Speaker, over the last 2 years, everybody has a COVID memory. It might be the masks that were mandated on folks across the United States. It might be that cup of coffee that you tried to drink, forgetting that your mask was on. It might be how we have seen incredible evolution--

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Illinois for his evolution in thought there and for yielding.

Mr. Speaker, over the last 2 years, we have seen just an absolutely incredible experience going through COVID. It might be the mask mandates that were thrust upon people, and as I mentioned, it might even be a funny memory of people trying to eat or drink coffee through their mask, as I know I have.

We have seen this evolution in the workforce where people are working remotely all over the United States, and we have seen millions and millions of people choose to leave the workforce.

This is something that has affected so many people. We have seen multi-generational businesses close, and we have seen fledgling businesses surge as a result of COVID-19, as a result of this pandemic.

We have seen the record speed at which vaccines, plural, have been developed under Operation Warp Speed. We have seen treatment protocols that have evolved. And, by some measure, we have seen up to a million Americans that have lost their lives.

Mr. Speaker, there is so much history behind COVID-19, behind this pandemic. There have been things that have been just absolutely remarkable, like the innovation in our pharmaceuticals, in developing vaccines, innovation in technology with the evolution of incredibly convenient technology like Zoom or Webex or GoTo Meeting or other technologies allowing people to videoconference, sometimes wearing shorts or pajama pants with their suit up top. This has been absolutely amazing, watching what has happened.

But perhaps, Mr. Speaker, the most powerful impact of COVID-19 is not necessarily the successes and failures, the misfires, the things that have worked well, but it has been our personal losses.

Mr. Speaker, the sponsor of this bill, Congresswoman Julia Letlow from my home State of Louisiana, lost just an incredible man, a man who had a servant's heart, a man who cared so much for those that couldn't necessarily fight for themselves.

Congressman-elect Luke Letlow was elected to represent the small communities around Louisiana and around this Nation, I will say it again, to fight for those that were, in many cases, incapable of having a voice by themselves that was needed to change policy. But, collectively, Congressman-elect Letlow was going to change that.

I want to thank Congresswoman Letlow, Luke's wife, and the Representative from that area, for having the leadership, for bringing this bill up, for making sure that we don't ever forget about all of the powerful lessons learned from COVID-19, that we don't forget about all of these powerful people, the heroes that lost their lives caring for others, in some cases; those people that were on the front lines trying to allow this country to continue, our economy to continue, our society to continue.

Mr. Speaker, I thank Congresswoman Letlow for her leadership on this legislation, and I want to thank her for recognizing all the lives that were lost in the history here. I urge adoption of the bill.

Mr. Speaker, it is very interesting where we find ourselves right now. Just a few years ago--in fact, within the last year--we have advocated for banning Russian oil. We have advocated for it. Guess who has opposed it, on the record, voting against banning Russian oil? It is a really interesting place where we find ourselves where, all of a sudden, things have turned and folks have realized, oh, my goodness, we have got to change our position, we have got to flip- flop, and we now have to ban Russian oil.

Mr. Speaker, look at the policies of this administration. Look at the policies of my friends on the other side of the aisle. We have seen record high prices, we have seen record increases in greenhouse gas emissions, and we have seen record energy insecurity as a result of these policies.

We have letters from Democrat Members of Congress to the administration begging them to work with OPEC Plus nations to increase their oil and gas production. We have had a more than doubling of our importation of crude oil from Russia under this administration.

The administration's failed policies have limited us to what they will tell you are two options and only two options. We can either buy Russian oil and fund the aggression of Putin into Ukraine, or we can pay higher prices in the United States.

This bill fails to address the underlying problem and actually provide a solution.

Mr. Speaker, you have seen these administration officials. Who are they talking to right now to backfill their production from Russia? Who are they talking to? They are talking to Venezuela. They are talking to Iran. They are talking to the Saudis. We are going to find ourselves right back in this situation.

The good news is, we have a solution for you. We can actually do what the President said in this very Chamber last week. We can buy American. We can buy American energy. Let's buy American energy, not Saudi, not Venezuela, not Russian. Let's buy American energy, because we have 38 billion barrels of oil we can produce here and trillions of cubic feet of natural gas.

We can do it safer here. We can do it cleaner here. That is what the motion to recommit allows. It allows us to unleash American energy opportunities, to unleash jobs in America, to unleash opportunities for Americans to go back to work and unleash the economic activity associated with it.

We can export liquefied natural gas from America to our allies in Europe and not have them 40 percent dependent upon energy from Russia, from Vladimir Putin continuing to this day to fund his activities attacking Ukraine and causing human rights violations all over that country.

I want to remind you, Mr. Speaker, it was President Biden that lifted the sanctions that effectively facilitated the Nord Stream 2 pipeline, and it was President Biden who more than doubled the importation of crude oil from Russia.

Mr. Speaker, I urge support of the motion to recommit.

Madam Speaker, look at what is happening right now. We are dependent upon foreign sources of energy from volatile places around the world. We are bringing in energy from African nations. We have recently brought in energy from Venezuela, from Russia, from Iraq.

Madam Speaker, we have these resources in the United States. The President stood in this very room and talked about buying American. Why can't we buy our own American energy?

Tonight and tomorrow, we are going to be talking about banning Russian oil. Well, I welcome folks to this discussion. We have been trying to do this for years. And unfortunately, my friends on the other side of the aisle have opposed our efforts, have opposed efforts to ban Russian oil.

You can look at history. Whenever you stop producing in the United States, it doesn't change demand. All it does is it causes you to get the energy from somewhere else. This is affecting people all across America.

As a result of President Biden's strategies, as a result of Democrats impeding good policy, we are now to a point where we have the highest gasoline prices in American history. We watched under President Biden where we nearly tripled our dependence upon Russian crude oil--nearly tripled it.

Madam Speaker, it has greater emissions. They have greater environmental impacts. And again, why can't we buy America's resources? These are flawed energy strategies that are impacting those people the most that can least afford it.

``Buying American,'' we support that term. We support American energy. We support putting Americans back to work.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Pennsylvania for yielding.

I just heard my friends on the other side say, let's follow the money. Let's follow the money.

Mr. Speaker, right now under this administration, we have gone from buying approximately 76,000 barrels of crude oil a day to surging to 198,000 barrels of crude oil every single day. If you add in other petroleum products, Mr. Speaker, let's follow the money. The additional $22 million a day that we are giving to Vladimir Putin, if you add it all up, we are giving him $7 billion a year. $7 billion a year that goes toward the $65 billion Vladimir Putin puts towards military spending every single year.

Yes, let's follow the money.

I hear my friends on the other side talk about emissions, oh, we can't do these things because it is going to cause greater emissions.

Let's once again look at the facts, Mr. Speaker. Under the previous administration, on average, emissions went down 2\1/2\ percent a year. Under President Biden they have increased 6.3 percent every single year.

Let's follow the money.

Do you know who is paying that money? It is the Americans that can least afford it, whether it is the $12 extra every single time they are filling up their vehicle with gas, whether it is the 700 to $1,700 a year in extra electricity payments that Americans are paying this year to heat their homes.

Mr. Speaker, yes, let's follow the money because the people in America that can least afford it, they are the ones that are paying the bill for these irresponsible, ill-advised energy policies that, Mr. Speaker, you can go back

and look at the Record, we are the ones who advocated otherwise.

Here is the deal: This administration has stopped offshore production, prevented new lease sales, prevented onshore production. This majority has tried to impose a $10,000 per year per mile pipeline fee, tried to raise royalty fees, increased severance taxes on domestic energy.

Do you think Vladimir Putin is doing the same thing with Russian energy? I can answer that, Mr. Speaker: Absolutely not.

The policies that this bill fixes are the errors that this administration and this majority in Congress made in imposing this energy crisis on us in raising energy prices for Americans that can least afford it.

Mr. Speaker, I am sorry that the facts don't result in the narrative that my friends on the other side are trying to establish. Let's be clear on why we have an energy crisis in America, why we are dependent upon Vladimir Putin for energy, why we are funding the military atrocities that he is carrying out in the Ukraine right now, and let's support this bill, this legislation that Congresswoman McMorris Rodgers and Congressman Westerman have pushed to ensure that we can have a clean American energy future.

Mr. Speaker, had I been present, I would have noted ``yea'' on rollcall No. 20.

Members Recorded Pursuant to House Resolution 8, 117th Congress

Adams (Brown (MD))

Allred (Wexton)

Armstrong (Murphy (NC))

Axne (Kuster)

Baird (Bucshon)

Beyer (Raskin)

Bishop (NC) (Budd)

Bowman (Ocasio-Cortez)

Brownley (Kuster)

Cardenas (Gomez)

Clarke (NY) (Kelly (IL))

Cleaver (Raskin)

Crist (Wasserman Schultz)

Cuellar (Correa)

Davids (KS) (Brown (MD))

Davis, Danny K. (Garcia (IL))

Dean (Evans)

DeSaulnier (Raskin)

Deutch (Rice (NY))

Doggett (Raskin)

Doyle, Michael F. (Evans)

Espaillat (Meeks)

Frankel, Lois (Kuster)

Gohmert (Weber (TX))

Grijalva (Garcia (IL))

Hagedorn (Carl)

Horsford (Evans)

Hoyer (Brown (MD))

Hudson (Murphy (NC))

Jacobs (CA) (Correa)

Jeffries (Kelly (IL))

Kahele (Case)

Keating (Cicilline)

Khanna (Gomez)

Kim (CA) (Steel)

Kinzinger (Herrera Beutler)

Kirkpatrick (Pallone)

LaMalfa (Rouzer)

Lawson (FL) (Evans)

Loudermilk (Fleischmann)

Lucas (Mullin)

Malinowski (Pallone)

Maloney, Carolyn B. (Wasserman Schultz)

McHenry (Cammack)

Meng (Kuster)

Moore (WI) (Raskin)

Nadler (Pallone)

Napolitano (Correa)

Payne (Pallone)

Pingree (Kuster)

Porter (Wexton)

Reed (Miller (WV))

Roybal-Allard (Correa)

Ruiz (Correa)

Rush (Kaptur)

Ryan (Kaptur)

Schneider (Rice (NY))

Sires (Pallone)

Stansbury (Garcia (IL))

Stauber (Bergman)

Steube (Cammack)

Suozzi (Raskin)

Timmons (Murphy (NC))

Tonko (Pallone)

Torres (NY) (Meeks)

Trahan (Wexton)

Velazquez (Meeks)

Wagner (Cammack)

Walorski (Banks)

Waltz (Cammack)

Watson Coleman (Pallone)

Welch (Raskin)

Williams (GA) (Kelly (IL))

Wilson (FL) (Cicilline)

Amendment No. 22 Offered by Ms. Jayapal

Madam Speaker, I want to thank Mr. Graves for yielding to Mr. Graves.

Madam Speaker, I rise in strong support of this legislation, and I want to thank our sponsor on this legislation, Congresswoman Sharice Davids, for working with us on this.

Congress is often the body that comes in and proposes legislation and then proposes solutions after something has happened, after something bad has happened. This is a different approach. This is Congress actually stepping in and being proactive.

This is bipartisan legislation that recognizes the United States leads the world in innovation related to aviation. The only way we are going to be able to do that, that we are going to be able to continue leading the world with these advanced technologies related to advanced air mobility, is by being proactive in this case.

We are talking about incorporating innovative technology that is going to effect virtually every aspect of our lives, but integrating it into one of the most complex and one of the most congested airspace areas in the world. This isn't something we can just do overnight once the technology is ready.

This legislation puts together a working group for us to look at how this is going to be integrated, what regulations we need in place, what infrastructure changes we need to have in place in order to facilitate this.

Madam Speaker, we can't cede this technology, this innovation, to other countries. The United States has the safest, most advanced aviation system in the world, but we are not going to be able to maintain that without being proactive, without thinking through all of the integration that is going to result; again, whether it be infrastructure or people who want to use urban air mobility to fly from one city to the other. In my home State of Louisiana, flying from Baton Rouge to New Orleans, as opposed to sitting in the parking lot that is Interstate 10 or those people that want to fly from Lake Charles to Houston for the day, because they don't want to live in Houston, and fly back and spend the night in Lake Charles. I am kidding, Texas friends.

Madam Speaker, the people that work in the offshore industry, the ability to fly through advanced air mobility to these facilities and come back, doing it safer; doing it with less fuel, less emissions; doing it more efficiently, less expensive; that is what this solution, this technology, potentially provides for us.

There have been studies that show that by 2035, this industry could employ 280,000 people, and the value of this industry sector could be $115 billion.

Once again, Madam Speaker, we are not going to realize those benefits without us being proactive and facilitating the integration of this technology into our communities.

Madam Speaker, even our military, the Department of Defense, recognizes the potential of eVTOL technology in its own operations, and that is why it is investing in the Agility Prime program to help foster the AAM industry.

The issues that we are looking at include aircraft certification, ground infrastructure, air traffic control, battery storage, cybersecurity, physical security, spectrum, and many other challenges. This legislation helps to ensure that we have solutions in place when the technology is ready.

Again, Madam Speaker, I want to thank the vice chair of the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, Sharice Davids, for her leadership and partnership in sponsoring the bill. I appreciate the work of Ranking Member Sam Graves and Chairman DeFazio in allowing us to move this forward in a bipartisan manner.

Madam Speaker, before I yield back, I also want to recognize one of the hardworking heroes and unsung heroes of this Congress. I want to take a few minutes to honor our Aviation Subcommittee Republican staff director Holly Woodruff Lyons, who will be retiring at the end of the year.

Holly was raised in sunny southern California, and she made the inexplicable decision to choose to go to Colgate University in freezing cold Upstate New York. I think she quickly realized the error of her ways and transitioned to the University of San Diego School of Law for law school.

She did some time in private practice, and then she began her federal service over 20 years ago, in 1999, where she followed in her father's footsteps and worked for the Federal Aviation Administration in the Airports and Environmental Law Division.

Holly came to the Aviation Subcommittee as counsel in May of 2002 under then-Chairman Don Young. Madam Speaker, also having worked for the dean of the House, I also question that decision.

When considering whether to take the job, Holly wondered whether she was too old to start a career on Capitol Hill. But her first subcommittee staff director saw there was something special about Holly, and he told us that one of the best decisions he ever made was recommending Holly to the committee.

Holly became the Aviation Subcommittee staff director in 2007, where she remained for most of the last 14 years, working under Chairman Mica, Chairman Shuster, and now Ranking Member Sam Graves. She did, however, spend a brief time as deputy general counsel to the full committee before returning to her rightful place in the subcommittee.

She made invaluable contributions, as the ranking member noted, to every aviation legislative effort over the past 20 years, including the Homeland Security Act of 2002; the Vision 100--Century Aviation Reauthorization Act; the Cape Town Treaty Implementation Act of 2004; the NTSB Reauthorization Act of 2006, and the Airline Safety and Federal Aviation Administration Extension Act of 2010. She served as the lead House negotiator on the European Union ETS Prohibition Act of 2011; the FAA Modernization and Reform Act of 2012; the FAA Extension, Safety, and Security Act of 2016; and the FAA Reauthorization Act of 2018. Recently, last Congress, she was also the lead House Republican negotiator on the 2020 Aircraft Certification, Safety, and Accountability Act.

In each one of these efforts, Holly has been a model staffer. She is professional, intelligent, conscientious, and hardworking. She is an excellent and fierce negotiator, as everyone who has had the pleasure of sitting on her side of the table, or misfortune of sitting on the other side of the table, knows. She fights for every advantage at every turn while remaining disarmingly pleasant and entirely unflappable.

In one memorable negotiation, though, Holly leaned forward, made a circle with her fingers, and told another committee in no uncertain terms that they had zero jurisdiction over a certain topic. As one former committee staff director is fond of saying: Holly plays for keeps.

Madam Speaker, there are two kinds of people that work on Capitol Hill: Those that have been schooled by Holly and those that will be.

But the reason everyone loves a good war story about Holly is that it contrasts so much with her usual personally. She is friendly, kind, approachable, and always ready to help. She has been a wonderful mentor and friend to junior committee staff. She has almost singlehandedly trained and mentored an entire generation of transportation and aviation policy professionals. There is no one who has worked with or for Holly who can say they haven't learned from her.

Madam Speaker, we often say that aviation is the safest form of transportation, as though that is the way it has always been. When we get on a plane, we don't have to think about whether it is safe or not because of the incredible hard work of people like Holly and

what they have done over the decades. It is only when we look back over the career of someone like Holly where we can see how much things have changed for the better. Without question, aviation is safer today than it has ever been, in no small part through the work of Holly Woodruff Lyons.

We thank Holly so much for her service to the committee, her service to the House of Representatives, and her service to the American people. Her work has saved lives and made this country a better, safer, and more prosperous place. We are sad to see her go, but we will not say goodbye. We still have her cellphone number. Instead, we will say, see you soon. We wish her and Mark all the best as they start this next chapter of their life.

Madam Speaker, I was the only member on the climate committee available to preside over a hearing during this vote. Had I been present, I would have voted ``yea'' on rollcall No. 322.

Members Recorded Pursuant to House Resolution 8, 117th Congress

Baird (Walorski)

Cooper (Clark (MA))

DeFazio (Brown)

Garcia (TX) (Escobar)

Hice (GA) (Greene (GA))

Huffman (Stanton)

Kirkpatrick (Stanton)

Lawson (FL) (Evans)

McHenry (Budd)

Meng (Jeffries)

Moore (WI) (Beyer)

Moulton (Norcross)

Napolitano (Correa)

Ocasio-Cortez (Pressley)

Payne (Pallone)

Rush (Underwood)

Sires (Pallone)

Wasserman Schultz (Soto)

Wilson (FL) (Hayes)

Mr. Speaker, I think everybody in this body wants an infrastructure bill. We all want to see better roads and bridges. We want to see more sustainable, resilient communities.

Mr. Speaker, this bill, about half of it actually is money for infrastructure. About half.

Looking back over the last few years that I have been here, we have been able to work through, we have been able to cut red tape, break logjams. In fact, projects, Mr. Speaker, that date back to before I was born, we have been able to work through all of the obstacles and impediments and get the authorization in place and get them funded.

This bill doesn't give us a fair shot. Let me explain. Mr. Speaker, in the law today it describes the criteria for how dollars are supposed to be handed out under various grant programs. The Secretary of Transportation came out and ignored all of that and invented his own new criteria for climate change, for racial equity, and for environmental justice.

I don't have any problems with those objectives, but what in the world do they have to do with transportation? When we saw them applied for the first time, we saw a community of 30,000 people get a $92 million grant, and it doesn't have national significance as the law requires.

In the President's budget for the Corps of Engineers, there is language in there that says they are going to fund projects that promote environmental justice in disadvantaged communities in line with Justice40; they are going to fund projects that promote a chance to join a union; and that they are going to refuse to fund projects that help to lower the cost of production of energy, lower the cost of consumption of energy, or that raises the revenue of energy-producing companies.

Mr. Speaker, this doesn't have anything to do with infrastructure. Why are they politically manipulating the dollars? As was noted, all the transit funds from these bills would fund almost 7 billion rides with Lyft or Uber. Why are we dumping all this money into empty buses? We need to spend it on real infrastructure, real priorities in a transparent, fair proces. This bill, unfortunately, fails to achieve those objectives.

Mr. Speaker, you can look back at history at highway bills and infrastructure bills, and all of these bills passed this House with strong bipartisan support. Seventy-five, 80 percent, 90 percent of the Members of Congress have supported these bills. You can look back, Mr. Speaker. For decades this has happened.

Why is this bill moving in an entirely partisan manner? Why is there not bipartisan support?

And the answer is really simple: Because this bill is not infrastructure. It

is not solving road problems and traffic problems that are plaguing this country.

What this bill does is it puts billions of dollars into things like EV charging stations. So if you are an American that owns the 0.6 percent of vehicles out there that are electric vehicles--the majority of which make over $160,000--the great news for you is you are going to get billions of dollars in federally paid-for subsidized charging stations.

The process needs to be fixed for delivering projects. This bill doesn't do it.

Why is it we are building projects around the country that have been around for decades?

It is because the process is flawed. It takes decades just to get a project approved, but don't worry, Mr. Speaker, because this bill fixes it for bus shelters.

This bill should be bipartisan, as has been done for decades. We need real traffic solutions, real investments in infrastructure, and unfortunately, this bill doesn't do it.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Speaker, I actually want to repeat what the gentleman from Pennsylvania just said: This bloc of amendments consists of 42 amendments.

All you Americans that are at home right now, your Member of Congress that you elected to come up here to debate, to influence, to fix the crisis we have in transportation and traffic right now, you get the choice to either support or oppose 42 different amendments, some of which may be good, some of which may be awful.

This is what democracy looks like right now under this Democrat majority, where the individual Members of Congress aren't even allowed to effectively represent their constituents.

This bill, including this amendment, simply adds more money to a bad system. The average American, Mr. Speaker, all they need to do is think about that road project, that traffic jam, they have in their community. All this bill does is puts more money in that very system that resulted in those problems in their community. It doesn't fix it.

In fact, it even diverts money from what should be infrastructure into things that have absolutely nothing to do with infrastructure, which, just to give an example of that, includes art. That is where your transportation dollars are going, art infrastructure.

Mr. Speaker, this amendment is so fundamentally flawed, this process is so fundamentally flawed, I urge rejection of this entire bloc.

Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Speaker, we have heard people talk about how this bill is going to help address climate change, and we have heard people try to suggest that our side doesn't care about it. The facts actually paint a very different story.

My friends on the other side of the aisle came in and tried very hard to force legislation that would mandate reductions in emissions in the power sector. That was going to significantly drive up energy costs. Thankfully, Congress didn't enact it.

But do you know what actually happened? By letting innovators innovate, by Congress not coming in and forcing regulatory mandates and forcing and choosing different types of energy technologies, the United States has reduced emissions more than the next 12 emissions-reducing countries combined.

Is it because of Congress' actions? No. It is because Americans are innovative, and Americans innovated their way out of this. We have been leading the world.

What this legislation does is it goes back, and it fails to learn from the lessons of the past. It tries to force technologies.

Right now, electric vehicle sales represent 2 percent of sales. Consumers don't want them.

In my home State, we drive pickup trucks and put our boats behind them. But don't worry, because according to Car and Driver, you are going to get to pull your boat 100 miles, and then you get to stop at a charging station, paid for by this bill. You will then get to sit there for 45 minutes, potentially get your truck up to 80 percent, and you can maybe then drive another, I don't know, 70 miles or so. It is going to be great.

This is crazy. This is absolutely crazy. Americans need traffic solutions. We need traffic solutions. We had 325 amendments submitted to this bill to try to improve it. Mr. Speaker, 149 of those were accepted, and 105 of those were Democrat amendments, not even giving Republican constituents across America the opportunity to be able to be represented.

Mr. Speaker, I urge rejection of this partisan, failed process that, for the first time in decades, has failed to yield a bipartisan bill.

Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Speaker, I heard my friends talk about how it has been innovation that has led us to emissions reductions. I find it fascinating and certainly look forward to that discussion.

But, Mr. Speaker, right now, just a few months ago, the United States was entirely energy independent. We produced all the resources that we needed to power our economy and to power our transportation sector.

What this bill does is begins forcing everything, manipulating markets in a direction that doesn't work.

Don't take my word for it. Let me give you examples about the State of

California that has tried to do the very thing that this bill does. The State of California currently has electricity prices that are twice those of my home State.

I ask the American citizens, Mr. Speaker, which American is asking to have their electricity bills doubled?

By the way, when you increase demand for electricity, the price goes up even higher. When you try to electrify the entire vehicle fleet, then prices go up.

Do you think they got a plan for this?

There is a study in this very amendment that tries to study how you are going to incorporate vehicles into the energy and transportation sector. They don't even know how they are going to do it, yet they are charging ahead boldly under this en bloc amendment.

Another great one in here: During the committee process on this, I offered an amendment, Mr. Speaker, to establish national centers of resilience. I got a commitment from the chairman saying: Yes, we are going to work with you on this.

They didn't work with us. But all of a sudden, when we filed our amendment, that one is discarded, and one pops up from a Democrat Member with our idea. It is now going to be in this en bloc for consideration.

This whole process just doesn't reflect democracy. I can't say it enough, Mr. Speaker: Decades and decades of bipartisan support, strong support, representing the leadership on how you negotiate legislation and bringing traffic solutions and transportation solutions to America.

In this case, there is no bipartisan support. This is a failed effort that fails to address the needs of the American public. It diverts funds that need to go to traffic solutions to things that, quite frankly, are going to play into China's hands and cause the loss of jobs. We need to be exporting American innovation, not exporting jobs to China, as this bill does.

Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I am prepared to close, but being in opposition, I reserve the right to close.

Madam Speaker, recognizing that I have the right to close, I continue to reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I would like to start a colloquy with the gentleman from Pennsylvania, who made a statement about how our national labs innovated us into this emissions reduction leadership role we play in the United States.

I ask the gentleman from Pennsylvania to explain to us about those innovations and how that contributed to emissions reductions.

I yield 30 seconds to the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Lamb) for the purpose of a colloquy.

Madam Speaker, reclaiming my time, I couldn't have asked the gentleman to make my point any more than he just did.

This bill attempts to force or manipulate markets in a direction that is simply not consistent with the resources, the workforce of America.

The gentleman is exactly right. He is exactly right. It is our natural gas revolution that has resulted in the United States leading the world in reducing emissions. It is not a result of someone coming in and forcing people to drive electric vehicles. It is not a result of forcing people to put solar panels on their homes. That is not it. It is the transition to natural gas.

As a matter of fact, the natural gas from the gentleman's home State, according to the National Energy Technology Lab in the gentleman's home State, has a 42 to 47 percent lower emissions profile than Russian gas, which is effectively what this bill forces to happen, more dependence on Russian gas.

A year ago, we imported zero barrels of Russian oil--zero--into the United States. This month, we are on a trajectory to import 7 million barrels, 7 million barrels of oil from Vladimir Putin. Thanks. This is crazy.

This bill just continues building on that. I really don't understand, Madam Speaker, what the gentleman is going to tell his own constituents when they are no longer employed. Folks say: Hey, don't you worry. We are going to get new clean energy jobs.

Madam Speaker, what has happened every single time we have developed new technology that wasn't tied back to America's resources? China steals the property. They steal the intellectual property. They steal the inventions and sell it back to us at a cheaper price--by the way, at the same time, causing greater environmental consequences using child enslaved labor.

Madam Speaker, what I urge is, let's apply cancel culture to the countries that my friends across the aisle are actually promoting right now, to China and Russia.

Let me say this again. This bill attempts to take California's model and apply it nationally, doubling the electricity prices in my home State.

Guess which State had the eighth worst emissions growth in America? Is it the State that carried all this out? No. It is California. Guess which State is the most dependent State on foreign energy? It is California.

I can't say it enough. We need to be exporting our innovation, not exporting our jobs. This is a flawed bill. It is an entirely flawed strategy that is being forced on American citizens under this legislation. People have the option right now to buy electric vehicles, and they are not doing it. It is 0.6 percent of the vehicles today.

Madam Speaker, I urge rejection of this amendment. I yield back the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.

Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Madam Speaker, traditionally what would happen in an amendment grouping like this is that Republicans and Democrats would sit down and decide which group of amendments everybody agrees on. There are actually some really good amendments that are included in this en bloc, some of which address some fundamental problems in our transportation system.

For example, there is an amendment in here by Congresswoman Mace. What that amendment does is after much research, the Department of Transportation couldn't even tell us how much money is being invested in roads and bridges. Couldn't even answer the question. Congressional Research Service couldn't. Government Accountability Office couldn't. We have tried for months to get an answer.

So this commission is a study to look at that, to give us feedback to understand where the dollars are going to help inform us on how to do a better job governing.

There is an amendment here that I want to say thanks to my friends across the aisle for that has to do with the resilience of materials of roads.

And again, there are good amendments, but, Madam Speaker, this is how the process is supposed to work. We are supposed to sit down and try to come to common ground and decide which amendments make sense and we all agree on and help to expedite this entire process to go from 325 amendments, hopefully, to a much shorter number, not by having unilateral control and someone unilaterally deciding they are going to let these amendments go and these not and design a group of amendments to intentionally fail, despite the fact that there is good policy.

So I will say it again, I think there are some good amendments in here. I look forward to hearing from my colleagues about their particular amendments and why they are good policy, and I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Meuser).

Madam Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Indiana (Mr. Pence), a leading member of the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee.

Madam Speaker, I yield the gentleman an additional 30 seconds.

Madam Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Fitzpatrick), one of the hardest working members on the Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure.

Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Brady), the leader of the Committee on Ways and Means.

Madam Speaker, I have the right to close so I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I believe we have the right to close, so I am going to reserve.

I am opposed to the amendment.

Madam Speaker, as I mentioned, there are a number of amendments in here that I fully support. This whole process is a flawed process.

I have heard the gentleman from Oregon (Mr. Blumenauer) bring up the coastal Louisiana and the loss of land. The ranking member of the committee talked about the loss in coastal Louisiana, and it is extraordinary.

We have lost 2,000 square miles of our coast. It is like taking the State of Rhode Island and wiping it off the map, which is why I care so much about this issue; and it is why I care that we actually provide solutions, not rhetoric. And let me explain.

Madam Speaker, the dirty little secret that my friends across the aisle will tell you is that the highly celebrated Paris accords that they are all out there advocating for and saying this bill is going to advance this Green New Deal and Paris accord commitments, the Paris accord results in an increase in global emissions. that doesn't fix what is going on in my home State. It doesn't do anything. It makes it worse.

As a matter of fact, in negotiations, Secretary Kerry conducted-- allows China to increase emissions another 50 percent between now and 2030. China today emits more than every developed country combined.

So these are the people who we are being asked to trust what happens to the people that I represent in coastal Louisiana?

Absolutely not.

Let me say it again. It is as a result of what we have done, as a result of what innovators have done that have resulted in the greatest reduction in emissions in world history. And don't take my word for it. That is a quote from the IEA's executive director--International Energy Agency's executive director.

Madam Speaker, these are flawed strategies. It is proven.

Who has cornered the market on rare earth and strategic minerals?

China has.

So who is going to be responsible for manufacturing the batteries?

China.

Who has made 80 percent of the global investment in battery technology and in manufacturing?

China.

Madam Speaker, I represent people from America, and that is who I am going to fight for. That is who I am going to defend. I am going to defend our land and prevent it from eroding and disappearing because of flawed policies. I am going to defend their tax dollars to prevent them being wasted on things that clearly play into China's hands.

Madam Speaker, I can't say this enough. I want to export American innovation or ingenuity, not our jobs, not our economy. This bill is fundamentally flawed. And representing the greatest loss of coastal wetlands in the United States, I won't stand for this type of behavior that squanders dollars and actually exacerbates the problem of coastal land lost and sustainability, and ecological productivity in my home State.

Madam Speaker, I urge that we stop this; that we start this bill over again; and as we have done for decades, that we come together in a bipartisan process, just like I know my friend from Oregon would be saying right now if roles were reversed.

Madam Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, had I been present, I would have voted ``yea'' on rollcall No. 194.

members recorded pursuant to house resolution 8, 117th congress

Babin (Nehls)

Boebert (Gosar)

Bourdeaux (Kuster)

Cardenas (Gomez)

Carl (Joyce (PA))

Cawthorn (Nehls)

Clark (MA) (Kuster)

Cohen (Beyer)

Fallon (Nehls)

Gallego (Gomez)

Garcia (IL) (Gomez)

Garcia (TX) (Jeffries)

Grijalva (Stanton)

Horsford (Jeffries)

Jackson Lee (Butterfield)

Jacobs (NY) (Garbarino)

Johnson (TX) (Jeffries)

Kind (Connolly)

Kirkpatrick (Stanton)

Lawson (FL) (Evans)

Leger Fernandez (Jacobs (CA))

Lieu (Beyer)

Lowenthal (Beyer)

McClain (Bergman)

Meng (Jeffries)

Mullin (Lucas)

Napolitano (Correa)

Owens (Curtis)

Payne (Pallone)

Ruiz (Aguilar)

Rush (Underwood)

Sewell (DelBene)

Steube (Franklin, C. Scott)

Strickland (DelBene)

Timmons (Wilson (SC))

Torres (NY) (Jeffries)

Wilson (FL) (Hayes)

Young (Joyce (OH))

Madam Speaker, 28 years ago, Earl Michael Willis was born in Brusly, Louisiana. When he was 14 years old, his sister, Rachael, died of cancer. He went on to go to Catholic High, my high school, and went on to LSU.

In 2018, he got engaged to his wife, Megan. He and Megan got married just last year.

In order to honor his sister Rachael's death, he said he was going to run a 100-mile ultramarathon, and he did so earlier this year in Key West, Florida. Unfortunately, Madam Speaker, that effort to honor his sister Rachael's life resulted in his death. The day after the ultramarathon, Michael Willis, at the young age of 27, passed away.

Madam Speaker, I want to honor his life. Our best wishes and thoughts and prayers to his mother, Cristal; his father, Earl; his brother, Nicholas; and his wife, Megan.

Madam Speaker, I ask that we have a moment of silence to honor his life.

Madam Speaker. I apologize for missing votes on June 25. I was meeting with the Secretary of Veterans Affairs in Louisiana to discuss issues impacting veterans in my district. Had I been present, I would have voted NAY on Roll Call No. 185.

Madam Speaker, I was unable to take part in debating and voting on the revocation of the previous administration's rule governing methane emissions due to meetings with the Secretary of Veterans Affairs to address long-overlooked issues impacting South Louisiana's veterans. The Baton Rouge VA outpatient clinic in my district is undersized and not well suited to the needs of the Capital Region's veterans. Multiple administrations have highlighted the need to authorize a new lease--but it hasn't happened and getting veterans timely access to quality health care remains a top priority for me.

Had I been in Washington, D.C., I would have voted against S.J. Res 14 to repeal the ``Oil and Natural Gas Standards for New, Reconstructed, and Modified Sources Review.'' We cannot afford to move backwards on President Trump's policies that put American energy first.

I support efforts to reduce methane emissions. I support smart regulations that result in reducing methane emissions. But I do not support an approach that results in stifling innovation and creates barriers to cost-effectively reducing methane emissions.

The United States has led the world in reducing greenhouse gas emissions and investing in innovation that will ensure continued reductions in emissions here and around the world. We produce resources and goods with a carbon profile envied around the world--that includes oil and gas. As global demand increases, as it is projected to do for natural gas, America should be supplying that demand. Especially if you care about global emissions and climate change.

With the deployment of innovative technologies, the use of our resources will become even cleaner. That's why we need a regime that encourages innovation and incentivizes the development and deployment of technologies to mitigate and monitor methane emissions. Putting up barriers or making U.S. production of resources more expensive will drive up global emissions because it gives the competitive advantage in the global market to higher emitting resources--like those coming from Russia and China.

This CRA is not about reducing methane emissions, it's not about climate change, and it isn't about national security. It is solely about reducing energy choices. Moreover, this is about regulating an entire sector of the U.S. economy out of business. The majority is not shy about stating their goal--whether through an outright ban or death by a thousand cuts. And what is most insidious is that the anti- American oil and gas agenda doesn't apply to fossil energy outside the United States.

In fact, their actions benefit and subsidize fossil energy in other countries. You don't have to believe me, just look at their actions: we've seen cheers when the administration stops the construction of pipelines at home, actions which cost thousands of jobs for American families, reduce our energy security, and ultimately result in higher global emissions. Democrats sat on their hands as President Biden green-lit the Nord Stream 2 pipeline to carry natural gas from Russia to our allies in Europe--resulting in a stronger Putin and higher global emissions than if the United States had supplied that energy.

The majority voted against an amendment condemning the Russia action and Russian pipeline. Emissions never factored into their vote. In fact, Russian natural gas exported to Europe has a lifecycle greenhouse gas emission profile at least 42 percent higher than U.S. liquefied natural gas exported to Europe from Louisiana. Their singular intent was to reduce demand for an American resource by increasing the supply of Russian natural gas to our allies.

At home, their opposition to pipelines has resulted in increased use of higher-emitting heating oil and the importing of significantly higher-emitting natural gas from Russia. And while opposing lower emission production in America, progressives have called for increased oil production in Iran, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Venezuela, and Russia.

Don't believe me? Let me read a quote from a letter signed by several members of the current majority to President Trump in 2018: ``Today we call on you to use all of your authority to . . . pressure the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) and cooperating countries to Increase World Oil Supplies.'' That letter was signed by, among others, the current Leader of the Senate, Chuck Schumer, and the author of the Green New Deal, Ed Markey--the same crowd who advocated for banning American production of oil, American pipelines, and regulating out of existence any remaining American oil and gas. If this were about emissions, they wouldn't be advocating for increased production from higher polluting countries while reducing production from the more carbon efficient United States.

Members of the majority have repeatedly voted against amendment after amendment that would have halted action if the action would result in increased global emissions. Let me say that again, they voted against lower emissions. I know because they were my amendments. It doesn't end there: in the infrastructure bill which we are set to consider next week, there is a designation of ``high performing'' states based on climate policies. We offered an amendment during committee markup that would remove that designation if those same policies resulted in a disproportionate negative impact on disadvantaged communities. This amendment was voted down. Under the current text of the Invest Act, states that are being sued by civil rights groups for climate policies that hurt disadvantaged communities will be rewarded .

They have voted against amendments that would have clamped down on child labor in Africa and slave labor in China, because it's inconsistent with the progressive anti-U.S. energy agenda. For every ton of emissions reduced by the United States, China has increased its emissions by 4 tons--and yet, policies coming from the other side will export jobs to China, increase global emissions, and increase American dependence on China.

Again, don't believe me? Let me read from a report put out by the Senate Democrats' Climate Committee: ``As we institute domestic decarbonization policies that increase overall production costs . . . we could see U.S. companies shift their production to countries that are less restrictive on carbon emissions . . . This will not only lead to an increase in total global emissions, but also the outsourcing of American jobs.'' And they haven't included a single policy in any of their climate bills to counteract this result of outsourcing American jobs and increasing global emissions. Is it any wonder why we question their motives for this action today?

There is a way to effectively address methane emissions without costing jobs and increasing global emissions. I am on board with that discussion. But it isn't about that. It's about one more of the thousand cuts to destroy American jobs, reduce American competitiveness, and increase global emissions.

Madam Speaker, I thank the gentleman for the opportunity to talk about this important legislation.

Before I get started, I do want to thank the chair of the subcommittee, Mrs. Napolitano; the ranking member, Mr. Rouzer from North Carolina; Chairman DeFazio; and Ranking Member Sam Graves as well. I do want to thank some of the other partners from Louisiana we worked with, Congressman Steve Scalise, former Congressman Cedric Richmond, and Congressman Troy Carter, who all worked with us on this important legislation.

Madam Speaker, Lake Pontchartrain is one of the largest saltwater lakes in the United States. It is incredibly productive. It is a productive ecosystem. There is much fishing, shrimping, and crabbing and oysters that are produced there. As a matter of fact, since 1997, over 40 million pounds of blue crabs have been produced almost annually.

The secret, Madam Speaker, if you can keep this between the two of us, is that much of that is actually headed to Maryland restaurants to improve Maryland crab cakes. That is right. Just don't tell anybody. They also put spice on the outside of the shells. It is really confusing what they do. The meat is on the inside.

But in any case, Madam Speaker, this is a huge watershed. It is about a 10,000-square-mile watershed, that comprises 16 parishes and four Mississippi counties, into this lake.

But more importantly, and why there is a Federal nexus here, is that, since the first time in 1937, they open the nearly 7,000-acre Bonnet Carre Spillway to shift water from the Mississippi River into Lake Pontchartrain and ultimately to the Gulf of Mexico as an emergency pressure relief valve. You see, Madam Speaker, the Mississippi River drains 32 States and two Canadian provinces. This is one of the largest watersheds in the world, and the Mississippi River is the largest watershed in the United States.

When the water hits a certain level--again, since 1937, when they began opening this, and it has been opened an

average of once every 10 years--it sends huge flows, hundreds of thousands of cubic feet of water per second, out of the Mississippi River into the Bonnet Carre Spillway and into Lake Pontchartrain, and it shifts from a salt or a brackish lake into a freshwater lake because of this huge surge.

As a result of the floodwaters coming from Canada and all over the United States, they come and impact the ecosystem of this lake.

So, what this legislation does is builds upon some of the efforts for ecological restoration.

I want to thank the great work of Carlton Dufrechou, Kristi Trail, and others who have done an amazing job in working to restore the ecological function of Lake Pontchartrain.

I again want to thank all the cosponsors and folks who have helped us to work on this legislation. It did pass unanimously last Congress, and I want to remind everybody here that there is a huge Federal nexus with this legislation. I urge its adoption.

Madam Speaker, I want to thank Chairman

DeFazio; the sponsor of the bill, the ranking member of the committee, Sam Graves; as well as Aviation Ranking Member Rick Larsen of Washington State.

Madam Speaker, we need to be able to have the authority to make incentive payments. We have seen an extraordinary shift in aviation travel. In April of last year, there was a 95 percent reduction in airline passengers. We recently saw TSA screen the same number of passengers as before the pandemic.

The aviation demand is coming back with a vengeance. Our airports are crowded. Our airlines are packed. Our airplanes are packed.

What this allows the FAA to do is to provide incentive payments to expedite the completion of construction projects at airports. This is for safety. This is for additional capacity. This is going to ensure that the aviation industry, that our airport infrastructure can keep up with increased demand.

And as the ranking member said, this same expedited authority and incentive payments is allowed in other forms of infrastructure. So I want to thank the ranking member, Sam Graves, for bringing up this commonsense legislation.

Madam Speaker, I urge its adoption.